TruffleShuffle

Agreed. The first time I saw that, a chill ran down my spine. It's just too soon... the scars have not healed.

to be fair, a lot of #4 starters have the ninth-best WHIP among major league starters. by the way, of the 118 pitchers who have thrown 60 innings or more this year, 110 of them have gotten better run support than rich hill. And the Cubs have scored 29 runs in his last 13 starts. Great job losers.

sweep? ah never mind, we lose.

i know people overreact a lot in game threads, but my God, this is dumb

he was doing just fine until the umpire forgot how to call a strike. I feel good about my prediciton that he'd finish top 5 in Cy Young voting... only thing I didn't take into account was how incompetent the Cubs' offense would be during his starts.

Given his minor league stats and his profile - lefthanded batter with good speed - I'd expect him to be a guy who consistently is above league average in BABIP. Here are his BABIP numbers: 2005: Lansing: .403 :shock: :shock: WT: .261 2006: WT: .311 Iowa: .393 2007: Iowa: .321

double f-r-i-c-k!

thought I would give this one a little bumparoo. Statistically, Eric hasn't had a great June -- only at 253/340/446/786 -- but there's reason to be excited. He had a poor April, with a sub-700 OPS and a 16/5 K/BB ratio. Some of that might be due to dealing with an illness and subsequent death in the family, for which he missed some time in (I believe) late April and early May. Since then, the numbers have picked up, but most importantly for me is the approach at the plate. In May and June, his ratios for K/BB have been 16/11 and 11/11, respectively. This works out to a walk rate of about 1 per 10 PAs, and a strikeout roughly once every 8.2 PAs. This is a pretty significant improvement in his strikeout rate, which probably is the biggest criticism of his ability as a hitter. With a more normal BABIP, he'd be having a very good June. So I think he's continuing to grow as a hitter - possibly another positive contribution by Von Joshua.

Black Sox? Come on.

Not true, he's had a lot of player failures. Spivey? Ponson? Unlike Hendry he's much more willing to experiment with several players at a position instead of paying top dollar for medicore talent. I was exaggerating when I said "all," but you can't deny that WJ flat out lucked into maybe the best hitter of this generation. It's pretty easy to have cash to throw around with a Pujols coming up from your system. I love some of his deals, don't get me wrong. Flat out steals, but it's not like Hendry hasn't pulled those off. I just don't see the vast difference in Hendry/WJ. They both target the types of players I absolutely loathe. Every once in a while they luck into some good moves or are handed premium talent (Prior, Wood, Pujols) by other people in the organization. Whether or not that talent stays healthy is a big factor in a team's success. Walt has had that. Hendry hasn't. Not even close. Before Albert Pujols, the cornerstones of the Cardinals were McGwire, Edmonds, Rolen. Here's what was given up for each of those guys: McGwire: Eric Ludwick, T.J. Mathews, and Blake Stein. Edmonds: Kent Bottenfield, Adam Kennedy Rolen: Placido Polanco, Bud Smith, Mike Timlin When you trade for the three cornerstones of your offense, and the best player you've let go is Placido Polanco, you've done a pretty good job. The Cards won three division titles and a wild card entry before Pujols was a major leaguer. Jocketty has tended to sign his premium players to team-friendly contracts, and even in some of the things he's being ripped for - Edmonds' current contract, Mulder, etc. - the risk has been relatively small, because the length of the contract is reasonable. He doesn't go after guys who are coming off of one big year, as Hendry has been prone to do. He doesn't hand out no-trade clauses for no reason; he'll let a guy like Mike Matheny walk to give Yadier Molina a chance (see Soto/Blanco); he generally knows when to cut bait with guys who have given his team more than expected. It's being very myopic to attribute an 11-year track record of success to luck and Albert Pujols.

judging by the records of the two teams, i'd say the sox lost

Don't do that. +1

they're not far from living in the basement of their division. Let's send them closer.

i like that people who bash hendry - the primary reason being his track poor track record of overall success - are not interested in a guy who has been the GM of inarguably one of the five most successful franchises in baseball since 1996. If Jocketty became a "free agent" after this year, I'd sign him without thinking twice.

not exactly

hmmm, 13 LOB for cubs, 4 LOB for opponents. nice job losers. good thing i gave up on this train wreck a solid month ago.

pretty much

survey says! cubs lose.

Doesn't that have a lot to do with this year, in which he has had to catch some of the easiest pitchers to steal off of? Aren't his minor league CS numbers pretty good? Most of the scouting reports I have read say he has a good arm, and it looks from a quick glance like about half of his SB allowed this season have come with Maddux on the mound. yeah somehow he has gone from good at throwing people out, to having a "lousy arm." I'm gonna blame Maddux/Chris Young for this one, not Bowen.

:roll:

the inspiration for this thread, jorge de la rosa.... what a bum

CHEAP, good fielder, OBP over .350 each of the last three years. Yeah, he won't replace Barrett's run production offensively, but he'll contribute better defense and free up some money to be used in the offseason. Plus, Barrett has passed the point at which catchers peak, and will probably be declining from now until he calls it quits.

given the thread title, I thought this was about the cubs.

I'll start with a gimme... Neifi Perez.

for how many years in a row does jorge de la rosa have to get shelled and walk people before his parent teams decide that he sucks?